Intangible cultural heritage (ICH) is a shifting concept, and so is the way we perform our research in this area. In Vietnam, since the 1990s, Vietnam National Institute of Culture and Arts Studies (VICAS), a research and education institution being established in 1971 under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, has been the leading agency in monitoring and implementing the National Target Program on ICH safeguarding. With a primary focus on making inventories of ICH elements, VICAS has contributed mainly to the establishment of a database containing a vast number of ICH still images, documentaries and written reports. Some lost and endangered ICH elements have also been restored and revived thanks to the efforts of VICAS researchers. However, while the achievement is undoubtedly significant, ICH inventory making and documentation seem to be insufficient to capture the dynamic nature of ICH.

Lunar month festival of the Mongols or holiday celebration of the first day of “White Moon” or “White Month” symbolizes the departure of winter and welcoming the spring of the new year. This festival and its rituals and traditions are unique and naturally accorded with a specific lifestyle of Mongolian nomadic culture. Therefore, during this festival, there are no gatherings of masses on the street to participate in folk parades and street carnivals as in urban cities and villages.

Shamanism is a phenomenon found in most parts of the world. The essence of shamanism is people's nature to overcome their limited abilities by creating and leaning upon supernatural being. This is a trait not only found in Shamanism but also in most religions as well. However, Shamanism is usually considered as a mere folk belief rather than a nationally recognized religion. \n

In 1995, pangalay dance guru Ligaya Fernando-Amilbangsa stopped teaching. The lack of diligence among students of traditional dance had caused her to lose her enthusiasm. Hopeful dancers requesting lessons at first failed to convince her to change her mind. But in January 1999 she decided to teach again, having collected a long list of applicants in the intervening years. Thus began a weekly community dance workshop in her suburban home in Antipolo City, Mega Manila. For those who joined the weekly sessions, learning from a dance master was exhilarating, especially on the eve of a new millennium. In 2000 the excitement over pangalay and other traditional dances of the Sulu Archipelago inspired the motley group of dance students under teacher Ligaya to formally establish the AlunAlun Dance Circle (ADC), with their mentor as company artistic director. ADC is a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving, conserving, and propagating pangalay, which, according to teacher Ligaya, has “the richest movement vocabulary among all Philippine dances, and the living link to the dance cultures in Asia.”

The Muong Cultural Space Museum is a cultural and art institution in Vietnam, deeply inspired by an artist’s desire to reproduce a whole living space of the Muong tribe. The Muong museum was the creation of its owner, Mr. Vu Duc Hieu. The museum is situated in the hills above a small, narrow limestone valley about 80 km from Hanoi to the west, in Hoa Binh City, where the ancient Muong people used to live. After almost ten years collecting and preparing, and another year for construction, the Muong Cultural Space Museum was officially inaugurated on 16 December 2007 by the chairman of the National Assembly of Vietnam, Nguyen Phu Trong, with a performance of the symbolic Muong gongs.

Namhaean Byeolsin-gut, a shamanic ritual of the South Sea area of Korea, is a village gut (shamanic ritual) held on the islands of Hansando, Saryangdo, Jukdo, and many other islands of the southern archipelago of the Korean peninsula. Hundreds of islands are densely located in the South Sea, with some smaller islands giving scenic views of the region. Behind the beautiful scenery, the majority of islanders depend upon fishing for their livelihoods. In recent years, island populations have decreased, with a particularly sharp decline among younger generations aged between twenty and forty. As a result, difficulties in the economic, social, and cultural situations of the islands have become more pronounced.

At this school, Ms Khankeo Syauksone and her colleague, two young mathematics teachers have devised new activities to help their students to learn. Since they began using culture as a tool for learning, the teachers have noted that students have become more confident in mathematics. Furthermore, they are more willing to help each other inside and outside the classroom, and they can see how mathematics is applied in everyday life.

Co-orgarnized by ICHCAP and Hue Monuments Conservation Centre (HMCC), this year’s Asia-Pacific ICH NGO Conference was held in Hue, Vietnam under the theme of ICH NGOs towards Sustainable Development of Communities.

Munmyo is a Confucian shrine in which various spiritual tablets of past Confucian scholars rest. In this shrine, thirty-nine spiritual tablets are enshrined that belong to Confucius, four disciples, sixteen Chinese Confucian scholars, and eighteen Korean Confucian scholars. Currently, the Munmyo shrine is in Sungkyunkwan, which was an institution of higher education during the Joseon dynasty and is now Sungkyunkwan University located in Seoul. Every February and August, according to the lunar calendar, commemorative rites are prepared and called Munmyo Jerye or Seokjeonje. Currently, Seokjeonje is listed as No. 85 on the Important Intangible Cultural Heritage List of Korea, designated in 1986.

Food plays an important role in spiritual rituals and worship for many faiths including Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Islam, and Buddhism. The food offered to God is called prasada/prasadam, which means a gracious gift. Prasadam could be any o!ering, but typically an edible food is firrst o!ered to a deity in his or her name.

The intangible cultural heritage is without borders but it has owner and sovereignty because the heritage is associated with people, their residence, and practice (Le Thi Minh Ly 2020). Hence, Émile Durkheim (1912), a French social anthropologist, in his famous book of the Australian tribal religious life, convincingly argued that the study of festive events was an essential element to understand people’s social life. He wasprobably the first scholar to conceptualize festivals as central social events in the life of “primitive societies”. Cau ngu festival recreates the traditional cultural space of a coastal fishing village, customs as well as traditional rituals, games and knowledge of the fishermen. In addition, the festival expresses people’s aspiration of an age-old philosophy of living in harmony with the sea, maritime spiritual beliefs and cultural nuances to be preserved and promoted in our life.